Ann Coulter finds an unlikely ally in her free-speech spat with Berkeley: Bill Maher

An unlikely person has come to the defense of conservative pundit Ann Coulter in her ongoing push to give a speech at the University of California at Berkeley: liberal television host and comedian Bill Maher.

Coulter was scheduled to give a speech at the university on April 27, but the university canceled it Wednesday, citing security concerns. In recent months, the campus has been the site of several political protests, some turning violent.

Though the school reversed its decision and extended a new invitation for Coulter to speak on campus on May 2, she rejected the offer. Instead, she has vowed to speak in Berkeley on the original date and is accusing the university of trying to restrict her rights to free speech.

Maher addressed the controversy on his show, HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher,” on Friday night — by first acknowledging how surprising his defense of Coulter might seem to his viewers.

“I know, we don’t like Ann Coulter’s views,” he said, to audience laughter. “I like her as a person. I’ve never agreed with one thing she ever said.”

Maher referred to his own similar situation with Berkeley, when some students petitioned to remove him as the university’s commencement speaker in 2014. School officials ultimately stuck by Maher, allowing him to speak.

“They got their act together and I wound up doing it, and apparently that’s what’s going to happen to (Coulter), I think,” Maher said. “But Berkeley, you know, used to be the cradle of free speech, and now it’s just the cradle for f—ing babies.”

Speaking to S.E. Cupp, a conservative political commentator and guest on his show, Maher compared the cancellation of Coulter’s speech to “the liberals’ version of book burning.”

“And I feel like this goes on all over the country on campuses,” Maher told Cupp. “They invite someone to speak who’s not exactly what liberals want to hear, and they want to shutter it. … And it’s got to stop.”

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